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Saturday, Jul 4, 2009
An Obama-propelled increase in African-American turnout, already apparent in early voting, may put more Democrats in Congress.
Editor's note: Read Mike Madden's piece on vulnerable Republican House and Senate seats here.
By Alex Koppelman
Read more: Congress, Politics, African-Americans, News, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Voting, Barack Obama, 2008 election, Alex Koppelman
AP Photo/John Bazemore
A poll worker hands outs stickers Oct. 16 to early voters in Atlanta. Early voting started Sept. 22.
Oct. 30, 2008 | Forget soccer moms. Forget hockey moms. When it comes to this year's down-ballot races — Senate and House seats, state legislatures and beyond — the Democratic Party's most loyal voting bloc could determine the outcome. Assuming that early trends hold, a Democratic wave bigger than the one that swept Congress out of Republican hands in 2006 could be coming, and if it does, it will probably be powered by African-American voters.
The question is how much the African American vote will increase this year, and how that increase will be distributed. A fair number of vulnerable Republican candidates are in disproportionately black states and districts, and a substantial jump in black turnout — especially in the South — could mean that the Democrats could pick up a significant number of seats in those areas. Data from early voting suggests that this surge could already be happening, and that even some of the Republicans who were considered relatively safe despite being in competitive battles are seriously threatened.
By Salon's count, the black vote could swing as many as 17 House seats currently held by Republicans who are running in competitive elections. It could also play a role in three campaigns for Republican Senate seats and in one gubernatorial battle. With that in mind, the potential rise in African-American turnout could be devastating to Republican hopes.
"In the general election, I think you're looking at anywhere between a dozen to potentially 20 battleground House districts where the African-American vote is going to be key," Doug Thornell, the national press secretary for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, says. "If our candidates can turn out a significant number of African-American voters in those districts, I think we're going to be in very good shape."
Thornell's count, which includes both Republican and Democratic districts, represents perhaps as much as a third of all the races the DCCC considers competitive.
It's no surprise, then, that Democrats have been working hard to ensure that African-Americans vote. Barack Obama's campaign has invested substantial amounts of money and energy in registering new voters in that demographic and in a get-out-the-vote operation focused on them. It's not just the Obama camp doing that, either; other arms of the party have been engaged in similar efforts, helped out by the Congressional Black Caucus.
That work appears to have borne fruit, at least judging by astounding early-voting numbers from states like Georgia, Louisiana and North Carolina. As of Oct. 29, and with two days still left in which to vote before Election Day itself, the number of people who'd voted in Georgia represented more than 40 percent of that total turnout from 2004. African-Americans have accounted for 35.2 percent of the early vote; they were 25 percent of the overall electorate in 2004 and make up 30 percent of the state's population. In Louisiana and North Carolina the numbers are not quite so striking, but they still bode well for Democrats.
"Normally we see Republicans using early voting at a much greater frequency than Democrats, and we see a much whiter electorate too. These numbers are a reverse on race and party identification," says George Mason University professor Michael McDonald, who's tracking early voting on his Web site. "Republicans are saying they're just picking low-hanging fruit, people who would've voted anyway. Well, yes, and no. In North Carolina, there are 100,000 voters who weren't even on the voter rolls, because North Carolina has one-stop registration." (In one-stop registration, voters can register and vote on the same day.)
David Bositis, a senior research associate specializing in black electoral politics at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, says that judging from new registrations and figures from the Democratic primaries, black turnout will be up 20 percent overall this year. Some places, he says, could see an even bigger increase. "In some of these states — like Virginia, for example — black turnout in the last presidential election was quite low ... there's going to be a big effort made to turn them out this time. In those places where turnout was low last time, I wouldn't be surprised if I saw a 25 and in some places even 30 percent increase."
In an interview, Bositis listed nine Republican House seats (including open seats vacated by a Republican) where he thinks African-Americans could give Democrats the win:
"I expect a majority of them probably are going to flip," Bositis said. "There clearly is a strong likelihood of a Democratic wave."
Republicans seem to agree. Of those nine seats, eight appear on the now-infamous "death list," a tally put together by GOP operatives evaluating competitive seats and the chance that they will flip. Only Rogers' seat was left off.
Next page: The black vote could also knock off New England's last remaining Republican House member
Where the GOP could get dirty
Why is Barack Obama now electable?
How big will Democratic gains be this fall?